Postediting

More About Post-Editing

By Mike Dillinger

Machine

translation (MT) software is here to stay. So what is a translator to do?

Not a lot, really. If you do very specialized marketing or literary translations, you probably will not see much MT software being used. But if you work with product or training information for global companies, for example, my crystal ball says that you will hear about MT or post-editing sometime soon. My colleague Laurie Gerber did a great job of summarizing lots of information about MT during her ATA webinar this past April and in an article in the November/December 2011 issue of this magazine.1 I would like to add some more information to the discussion, based on recent post-editing workshops I gave for the Northern California Translators Association, at ATA’s 52nd Annual Conference in Boston, and for other groups.

Translation Memory and Machine Translation To work comfortably with MT software, it helps when you understand what it really does. Machine translation software is just like the translation memory (TM) products with which we are already familiar. It does not really translate; it only helps us reuse

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To work comfortably with machine translation software, it helps when you understand what it really does. words and segments that have already been translated. That’s it. There is no android exterminator hiding in the software, no black magic, no cybermega-brain. Here is a breakdown of the main capabilities of MT. Good Matches: The TM products that are so familiar to us check new sentences against the existing segments that we put in memory and then return the good matches. We use our skills to double-check whether the “good” matches make sense in the context or need tweaking and polishing. Machine translation software does the same kind of matching. In fact, with products like those from Systran and ProMT, you can actually plug the TMs that you already have into your MT system. The system will check for good matches in your memories before it does anything else.

Fuzzy Matches: If there is no good match, we can have recent TM products “assemble” a translation from text fragments in order to give us more suggestions from which to work. We use these half-baked suggestions to craft good translations faster, even though we end up ignoring a lot of what is suggested. Machine translation software does the same thing: it assembles translations from bits and pieces, but in a much more sophisticated way. Machine translation software extends TM technology with the ability to build more and better “assembled” translations. So we get more and better suggestions with which to work.

Non-Matches: Finally, if a TM product cannot find enough information to even guess at a translation, it gives up and does not suggest anything. Machine translation software is

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much more tenacious! It tries very hard to assemble a translation, then shows us the best that it can do, even if it is not very good. That is often much better than nothing. In other words, MT turns non-matches into fuzzy matches so we can craft great translations faster. Of course, just like with fuzzy matches from TM products, we always have the option of ignoring the suggestions.

The bottom line is that MT software does just as well with good matches and performs better on fuzzy matches and non-matches than TM products.

Post-Editing?

So what is all this stuff about “post-editing”? We just review pretranslated documents as usual, right?

Yes and no.

If the people who send us translation jobs know what they are doing when they use MT software (no guarantees here!), we get a pre-translated TM file (probably TMX) full of exact matches and fuzzy matches, but without leaving anything blank. It is almost the same thing that we get if we pre-translate a document ourselves.

“Full” Post-Editing: If the client wants, as usual, our best work, then we tweak and polish and complete the pre-translation to make sure that the final version is ready for publication.

The only real differences with MT software are that there is always some suggested translation, and some of those suggested translations are stranger than usual.

Is this kind of post-editing a new skill that requires extra training?

Experienced post-editors say it is very similar to working with fuzzy matches. Colleagues who review human translations say that postediting is very similar to that, too. But

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Machine translation does not really translate. It only helps us reuse words and segments that have already been translated. you will want to develop new tricks and techniques for working with MT output, like correcting specific terms throughout a document before you check it line by line.

“Minimal” Post-Editing: Some clients use MT software to translate very large amounts of information that they think is not so valuable. For example, databases of technical support information or comments in user forums. In this case, clients often ask for “minimal” post-editing or “rough” translations.

They explicitly do not want our best work. They want us to fix only the really grotesque problems in the pretranslated version. In other words, the problems that make it impossible to understand.

This kind of post-editing takes some getting used to. In this case, we are supposed to ignore errors and stylistic infelicities that do not garble the message. Yes, leave them in, even though they are incorrect. For this kind of post-editing, we often see guidelines like: • Do not change understandable sentences.

• Do not change capitalization, punctuation, or synonyms.

• Change only what is essential to ensure understanding.

• Do not use synonyms to make the translation more original or interesting.

• Style does not matter; information accuracy does.

• If an improvement is not immediately obvious, move to the next segment.

Is this kind of post-editing a new skill that requires extra training?

Many people say it is. Even without MT, we often need different translation strategies in other situations, particularly when the source text is poorly written, when there is a tight deadline, or when the client wants something different. With minimalist postediting, we are supposed to use a strategy that is fast and cheap, not creative and perfect, to meet the client’s needs. When I train post-editors, I see that they enjoy the opportunity to understand the differences and develop new strategies for their clients’ needs.

Business as Usual?

Clients expect a discounted rate when they give us pre-translated documents. They pay less for exact matches than for non-matches, assuming that better matches mean less work for us.

On average, this works out pretty fairly for everyone.

But MT software is still new · 21

More About Post-Editing Continued to clients and to translators, so it is often unclear how much of a discount to give. And the quality of MT output can vary wildly, often because people do not know how to use the software effectively. (As a consultant, I help organizations start to use MT, and I have seen some pretty crazy attempts!)

So, I find that a single, fixed rate for post-editing jobs (even for the same client) is not a good idea. (One posteditor I talked to “fired” a client because the MT output was getting worse and worse—not enough maintenance of the system—but the client wanted her rate to stay the same.)

Three things will help you decide whether to accept a post-editing job and how much to charge: 1) the client’s quality requirements; 2) your usual post-editing speed; and 3) the quality of the MT output. All of this boils down to how quickly you can finish a particular project. Your productivity determines your salary.

Consider the example of someone who charges US$0.10 per word for her usual translation jobs. If she translates 2,000 words in an 8-hour day, she makes about $25 per hour. If she is more experienced, is familiar with the topic, or the text is easy to read, then she might be able to translate 3,000 words per day with the same great quality. That is about $37.50 per hour, or 50% more than usual. In this situation, productivity is a better predictor of salary than word rate.

Now she decides to accept a postediting job at a 40% discount in the word rate. Will she make less? If she post-edits 4,000 words per day, then she makes $30 per hour, which is more that what she earns for her usual translation jobs. If she is more experienced and the MT output is of better quality, then she might post-edit 6,000 words per day (or more!). This means that she will earn $45 per hour. This is

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almost twice as much as for her usual translation jobs, even though her word rate is much lower than usual. Of course, this only works if the MT output is good enough to enable her to post-edit this quickly. And it often is!

Good MT output is a breeze to post-edit, but if the people who send us translation jobs do not know what they are doing (a pretty common occurrence!), then the quality of the output will be worse than usual or simply horrible. Clients probably will not even know how good or bad the output is, so they will want a standard rate for what they think is “the same” post-editing work. Your safest bet is to measure your productivity on a sample of each project before you

give a price or accept the job.

Of course, another option is to use MT software yourself so that you know that the output will be good enough to make you more productive.

But that is a topic for another day.

Note 1. Laurie Gerber’s April 27th webinar (“Is Machine Translation Ever the Right Tool for the Job?”) can be purchased from ATA’s website at www.atanet.org/webinars. Laurie’s article (“Questions and Answers About Machine Translation”) appeared in the November/December 2011 issue of The ATA Chronicle, pages 21-27.

Save the Date!

Association for Machine Translation in the Americas 10th Biennial Conference October 28-November 1, 2012 San Diego, California The Association for Machine Translation in the Americas (AMTA) will hold its 10th biennial conference in San Diego, California, from October 28 to November 1, 2012.

This conference immediately follows ATA’s 53rd Annual Conference, October 24-27, which is also being held in San Diego. AMTA promotes research and development of automated language translation technology. The co-location of the two conferences is an excellent opportunity for human translators and people who develop and use machine translation to understand each other’s work better, and to understand the challenges and opportunities facing the translation industry as a whole. Check AMTA’s website in the coming months for more details: www.amtaweb.org.

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Translation Tango

By Tony Beckwith

(The following was originally published in the Spring 2011 issue of Source, the newsletter of ATA’s Literary Division.)

Tango is music and words

and movement. It is also an attitude: a way of talking about how life treats us and how we feel about that.

It was originally the expression of an urban working class that saw life in terms of raw, limited options. In the world of tango, passions are barely restrained, betrayal lurks in every shadow, and rejection finds no solace.

Like any art, tango is also a form of therapy that allows us to experience the giddy sweep of emotions involved in the perceived lifestyle of the tango singer, as portrayed in black-andwhite movies from the 1930s.

Tango lyrics evolved into an art form that sets trenchant, often cynical observations against a musical background that ebbs and flows with the provocative rhythms of the piano, the

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Tango is a physical experience as well as a virtual or a literary one. bass, and the bandoneón (an accordion-like instrument).

I learned to shield my foolish heart from those who laugh as they tear my world apart They say that love and faith are lies I look away, sheltered by my alibis1 Tango began as an after-hours event, a nighttime celebration that made daily burdens easier to bear and provided a forum for the boundless energy of youth. It was the blues, the jazz, the flamenco of Argentina and Uruguay—it was the music of ordinary people, the disenfranchised, tiny cogs in the incomprehensible machine

of a newly industrialized society.

Backstreet dives in seedy barrios in Montevideo and Buenos Aires created the environment where tango music and lyrics fused together and movement was added by the dancing public. Now the triangle was complete, with the beating heart of the music and the mournful lament of the words bewitching the dancers as they stepped away from their everyday lives and surrendered to the seductive power of the tango.

Time passed and the tango made its way into the black tie world of the swankiest clubs in town. It was taken to Europe, where it was enthusiastically received by the notorious · 23

Translation Tango Continued after-hours crowds in Paris, London, and Berlin. Along the way it did some social climbing, traveled on first-class ocean-going liners, and hobnobbed with celebrities at the horse races. All this helped to intensify tango’s world-weary outsider quality, and allowed the lyrics to ponder life from different perspectives. The boundaries became more elastic and all the while the music and lyrics became more intense, more introspective, exploring different moods and sensual experiences as the dancers moved around the floor in a trance.

Tango, then, is a physical experience as well as a virtual or a literary one. So how should we go about translating a tango? We should read it like a poem, for tango is certainly poetry. We should sing it like a song, of course. And we should view it like a movie, with a soundtrack that fills in the gaps of the story and conveys the mood. That—the soundtrack—is what we must translate, but we should not separate the words too much from the music. For the music and the lyrics are like two tango dancers, both involved in the same event but each approaching it from a different angle, blending and intertwining in ways that are as mystifying as they are beautiful. The lyrics are not necessarily structured in a standard recurring pattern and do not always appear to fit smoothly into the music, as they do in some styles. The singer and the orchestra sometimes seem to be dancing both with and against each other in a tense partnership that proves that it takes two to tango.

The singer—purists will say tango singers can only be from Argentina or Uruguay—understands this dynamic and knows how to stretch and squeeze the words to make them fit the cadences of the music, trimming his or her lyrical sail to flutter and billow in the musical winds.

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The translator must also be skilled at working with narrative.

The translator must be aware of these factors and the tension of opposites that holds them in place, and must attempt to recreate as much of that as possible in the target language.

Like an actor, the translator seeks inspiration in personal experience, and looks inward to find the emotional charge needed to express tango’s signature bitterness and despair2: Full of hope, a man searches every day for the path that he once dreamed of as he yearned to find his way.

Knowing that the road is long and hard he is bloodied and he’s scarred by the dream he won’t betray.

He drags his poor body over thorns for the one who cruelly scorns him as he worships at her feet until his heart has ceased to beat.

That’s the cruel price he has to pay for all those kisses gone astray and fickle love that slips away: a heart that’s wept until it’s drained and bruised from being so callously abused.(**) Montevideo and Buenos Aires are port cities where waves of migration from Spain and Italy washed ashore in the late 19th and early 20th century.

These migrants either went out to the sheep and cattle ranches of the interior or stayed in the city and worked in the slaughterhouses, the packing

plants, and the docks. They were tango’s earliest audience. The overlapping of languages and cultures created new words and expressions, and a nascent slang—lunfardo—soon found its way into tango lyrics that reflected the gritty, rootless lifestyle of these new Rioplatenses.

If I still had the heart that I once had and freely shared; If I could love again as once I gladly dared; Then I could kiss you as I gaze into your eyes without remembering the lies that I once failed to recognize until too late when they had sealed my wretched fate. (**) In its early days, tango was a kind of theater, a vehicle for exhibitionist behavior, and has never lost its sensuality or its sense of melodrama. After all, Italian street opera and Spanish zarzuela are in its genes. It can at times sound very much like a soap opera, a telenovela, of the kind churned out in Argentina and much beloved everywhere in the Spanishspeaking world. Tango speaks of love in all its phases and guises, but is at its most eloquent when describing the heartbreak of love betrayed, unreciprocated or rejected. These are lyrics to sing in the wee blurry hours of the morning, when passions are either inflamed or doused, and tomorrow is a thousand miles away.

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I was the prettiest girl in my barrio Nuns ran the school where I used to go And though my parents were always broke I hung around with lotsa swanky folk Now I’m an artist, singing in a cabaret they call me a floozy and other things too I’m just a party-girl, an easy lay because I believed a man’s lies were true Colored lights attract the nightlife throngs to the cabaret’s exciting charade Where I live out their fantasies and sing their songs and try to forget the mistakes I’ve made (***) The emotions expressed in tango are not, of course, unique. Songs in every genre speak in anguish or joy about roughly the same things, and the lyrics of all long-established forms become smooth and well-polished over time. The translation must attempt the same smoothness and convey the same moods. A translator must, naturally, have a keen ear for speech patterns, especially for slang in the target language, because a tango singer will often be singing directly at someone or something—a lover, a friend, a honeysuckle vine clinging to a wall—and the translation

Don’t Miss!

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We should read it like a poem, for tango is certainly poetry. is essentially a soliloquy. Tangos frequently tell stories, and the translator must also be skilled at working with narrative. Exercising in these various forms of writing is good for the translator; it broadens us and makes us ever more versatile. It takes us beyond prose, where the absence of music— actual or implied—deprives us of the challenge of fitting lyrics into an existing structure by chopping up sentences into single words and rearranging them in pursuit of mood and flow as much as meaning.

Pain takes isolation to extremes and suffering makes us blind, or so it seems.

But I am cursed by a cruel coldness worse by far than burning coals of hate, than the void where lost souls congregate, than the ghastly tomb where my love endures its fate: cursed and robbed forever of all my dreams. (**) Tango is an emotional rollercoaster, like soccer, the other national obsession. One day in 1964 I was in the Bar Dos Hermanos, half a block from where I lived in Montevideo. A soccer

ATA Interpreters Division/ Spanish Language Division Mid-Year Conference March 16-18, 2012

January 2012

Orlando, Florida www.atanet.org/divisions/ ID_SPD_conference_2012.pdf

match had just ended badly for a local team. Manolo, behind the bar, twiddled the dial on the radio till he found a station playing tango music. He turned up the volume. “That’s how it is,” he said.

“We have fútbol or we have tango.

Fútbol can make you happy or sad for a few hours, but tango is with you every day of your life.”

Notes 1. From Madreselva (Honeysuckle), 1930: lyrics by Luis Cesar Amadori; music by Francisco Canaro. First performed at the Maipo Theatre (Buenos Aires) by Tania, who then recorded it in 1931.

Later performed by Libertad Lamarque in the 1938 Argentine movie of the same name. Translated in 1996 by Tony Beckwith.

2. The other lyrics in this article are from Gracias por venir, the musical by Adrian Sorrentino performed in Washington, DC, in November 2010.

The two tangos featured here are: (**) Uno (A Man), 1943: lyrics by Enrique Santos Discépolo, music

by Mariano Mores. (***) Mi barrio (My Neighborhood), 1923: music and lyrics by Roberto Goyeneche (El Polaco).

Translations (including tango lyrics) by S. Alexandra Russell and Tony Beckwith.

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Interpreting and the Digital Revolution

By Barry S. Olsen

In May 2011, InterpretAmerica CoPresident Barry S. Olsen presented the keynote speech to members of the National Association of Judiciary Interpreters and Translators (NAJIT) at their 32nd Annual Conference in Long Beach, California. We print the speech here in its entirety.

I am both humbled and honored

to be with you today. I wish to thank NAJIT’s board of directors and the Conference Committee for inviting me to be with you in Long Beach today. Having been asked to speak to a distinguished group of judiciary translators and interpreters, knowing that I myself am not one, is a responsibility that I take seriously. As my CV attests, I am a conference interpreter. And although we conference interpreters do not often think about this, the genesis of our profession is actually in legal interpreting. In large measure, conference interpreting is what it is today because of the International Military Tribunal in

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If we fear technology and its impact on our profession, we will become a victim of it.

Nuremburg. So, in a sense, I stand before you today speaking to my professional roots.

Events that play out in courtrooms across the country, and around the globe for that matter, have significant and lasting consequences for individuals and societies. The weight of those consequences warrants that all parties involved understand the proceedings.

And you are there to make that happen.

I honor and respect your work.

The Digital Revolution But I have not come today to speak with you about the importance of quality language services in law enforcement and legal proceedings.

You understand that better than I. I have come today to speak with you about the profession of interpreting as a whole and its incipient relationship with the flood of new technologies that have revolutionized modern communication.

The introduction of new technologies for the delivery of translation and interpreting services is growing at an ever increasing rate in legal and other settings. However, just how this trend affects our professions will largely depend on how translators and interpreters react to these changes … and which battles we choose to fight.

In today’s new media landscape, television companies, newspaper com-

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panies, and telephone companies have learned this lesson and morphed into “media companies” and “communications companies.” They understand that their value is derived from the services they provide (voice communication, text messaging, e-mail service, etc.) or the content (television programs, news, entertainment, movie schedules, etc.) they deliver. Describing themselves by the infrastructure they use to provide their services was holding them back and making them anachronistic.

Old means of disseminating information (newspapers and broadcast television, for example) are being displaced by websites, blogs, and streaming video. Old ways of doing things have fallen by the wayside. For example, how many of you flew to attend this conference? How many of you booked your travel online? How many of you worked with a travel agent?

Another example: How many of you speak with friends or relatives who reside outside the U.S.? How many of you use a voice-over Internet protocol (IP) application such as Skype to communicate with them?

There are many other examples: photography, video rentals, even the postal service has had to adapt to new technologies over the past decade.

Suffice it to say that digital technologies have touched almost every aspect of modern life to some extent. One example that hits closer to home is translation. Word processing software, translation memories, and machine translation have radically changed and will continue to change the way translators work. And I do not think any translator longs for the days of translating with nothing more than pen and ink or even a typewriter.

Interpreting, however, is not as far along in its courtship with new technologies. Make no mistake, automation and computers will not replace translators

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Technology is simply the infrastructure that is used for us to deliver our services. and interpreters; they have changed and will change the way in which we work and where we work. Pioneering efforts are underway to introduce new ways to deliver interpreting services. And some sectors or language combinations like English/American Sign Language have been delivering interpreting services remotely for some time now. Many of you here today may have already worked with technologies such as video relay interpreting over the Internet, telepresence, or voice-over IP, not to mention over-the-phone interpreting, which has been around for a couple of decades now. And I would wager that your experiences have ranged from good to downright unacceptable. But the important thing to remember is that, in essence, these technologies are simply the infrastructure that is used for us to deliver our services. (Remember the example of television companies turning into media companies in order to adapt?) The interpreting task is essentially the same as it has always been, regardless of whether we are standing next to those who need our services in a triadic formation, working from an ISO-standard interpreting booth in a conference room, or in an adequately equipped interpreting studio across town or across the country.

Two Questions This leads me to two basic questions that may be on your minds as well.

The first question: What will be the impact of technological developments on the future of face-to-face or on-site interpreting?

Let me try to answer the first ques-

tion this way. Over the past 50 to 60 years, the basic modalities of interpreting (consecutive, simultaneous, and sight translation) have not really changed, nor has the technology used to provide them. That means that professional practice, in broad terms, has remained more or less static for several decades. Think about that for a moment. During that same period, written and oral communication have become virtually instantaneous. We are slowly but surely moving to a paperless environment, photography has gone digital, and book, music, and video distribution has gone online and now wireless. And while many in our profession continue to maintain that interpreting cannot be done unless the interpreter is physically present in the same room as meeting participants, depositions are being conducted via telepresence, business executives on different continents meet via video conference, and webinars reach out to tens of thousands of interested participants around the globe. And it does not stop there. Digital technology has changed the way doctors practice medicine and the way lawyers practice law. It has changed the way politicians run for office and the way we shop for everything from food to clothing. So can we honestly expect technology not to have a profound influence on the way we do our job as interpreters when virtually every other area of human endeavor has been touched in some way by new technologies?

I think we can safely say that technology is already radically · 27

Interpreting and the Digital Revolution Continued changing the way we deliver interpreting services, and translation has been transformed over the past decade because of technological innovation.

That same innovation has created more work than ever before for translators.

That said, face-to-face or on-site interpreting will not disappear. The circumstances in which it is warranted will become more defined and clear-cut.

Economic and other forces will dictate when and where it is used. It will be seen as one of several delivery modes.

Tele-interpreting or distance interpreting use will increase as delivery technologies become more userfriendly and robust. By that I mean, the technology will be dependable enough for us to do our job and we will be able to hear and see the participants of an interpreted interaction adequately, and they us. It is interesting to note that modern communications technologies are increasing interaction across cultures and borders, which has the potential to expand the use of interpreting. For example, the number of online meetings using Web-based meeting services is growing rapidly, with different entities holding tens or hundreds or perhaps even thousands of online meetings each month. Granted, most of these meetings are monolingual, but interpreters’ services are already being retained for online meetings and webinars. I expect this only to grow.

However I am concerned with the lack of involvement of the interpreting profession as a whole in the development of these technologies that we will eventually be expected to use, if we have not had to use them already. To my fellow interpreters, I invite you to take an interest in these new technologies. We must understand what they can and cannot do and be able to communicate clearly the

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If the motivation behind the introduction and use of technology is limited to a desire to cut costs, then interpreters, users of interpreting, and agencies are in trouble. working conditions we need to do our job well without detriment to our health and well being. To the technology developers I say, bring the interpreters into your discussions about product development. Consider how your current technologies being used in mainly monolingual environments can appropriately be adapted to facilitate multilingual communication in consecutive and simultaneous modes. Familiarize yourselves with existing technical standards for video and audio transmission for the purposes of interpreting. And let us help you build the tools that we need to do our job well and help people from different languages and cultures communicate like never before. If the motivation behind the introduction and use of technology is limited to a desire to cut costs, then interpreters, users of interpreting, and agencies are in trouble. I do not want to beat the proverbial dead horse of “client education,” but that is what it will take.

If we fear technology and its impact on our profession, we will become a victim of it. If we embrace it wisely, we can shape it to our own benefit and to the benefit of those we serve. I laud NAJIT’s efforts to prepare position papers on a number of important issues facing judiciary interpreters, in particular the need for team interpreting and the use of tele-

phonic interpreting. And I would encourage your association to consider drafting a position paper on new technologies and modes of delivery such as videoconference interpreting and remote interpreting.

In Europe, the AVIDICUS Project, which conducted some of the first research into the use of videoconference interpreting in criminal proceedings, is an excellent example of how interpreters, academe, government, professional associations, and the private sector can work together to study the impact of new technologies on professional practice. Similar efforts in the U.S. would be a step in the right direction.

Now, let me try to answer the second question. Where do our strengths as interpreters lie in this new landscape?

Our strengths as language professionals lie where they always have.

That is, in our knowledge of languages and cultures and our ability to facilitate cross-language and crosscultural communication better than any technology can. Speech is perhaps the most human of all forms of human expression. And that is what makes human interpreters essential.

In an increasingly interconnected and multilingual world, the demand for professional language expertise will only grow, in some cases exponentially, which is why there is such a

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push to find technological solutions to help deliver more efficient and more cost effective language services.

Our strength lies in our ability to define who we are as a profession and to help society understand that definition. We do ourselves no favor as a profession by remaining fragmented and isolated based on where we interpret or for whom we interpret. Bringing interpreters, technology providers, educators, and users of interpreting together to discuss the future of our profession/industry was the idea behind the creation of the North American Summits on Interpreting. In June of 2010, the first North American Summit on Interpreting took place in Washington, DC. More than 160 interpreters from across the profession, end users of interpreting services, institutional employers of interpreters, agencies, and solution providers met for one day to take stock of interpreting in North America and to envision its future.

One of the notable outcomes of the Summit was the publication of The Interpreting Marketplace: A Study of Interpreting in North America. This 89-page market study prepared by Common Sense Advisory seeks to capture a snapshot of interpreting in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico that gives us an idea of where we stand as a profession and can serve as a point of reference for future studies.

InterpretAmerica has made this study available free of charge as a service to the profession. Copies may be downloaded from interpretamerica.net.

Our strength as a profession lies in unity and coordinated effort. Sectorspecific professional associations for interpreters have existed for years.

There are international, national, and regional associations for conference interpreters, legal or judiciary interpreters, medical interpreters, and interpreters for the deaf. They all serve

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Related Links AVIDICUS Project www.videoconference-interpreting.net

InterpretAmerica www.interpretamerica.net

Interpreting: Getting It Right www.atanet.org/getting_it_right_int.php

National Association of Judiciary Interpreters and Translators www.najit.org

The Interpreting Marketplace: A Study of Interpreting in North America www.interpretamerica.net/publications

specific and important purposes. However, coordinated efforts to represent the interpreting profession as a whole, in my view, would be a welcome development. Through the Summits on Interpreting, we seek to encourage dialogue among the many interested parties from the interpreting profession and industry.

In sum, my message today can be distilled into two main points. First, interpreters must embrace technologies that will be used to deliver our services in order to shape them to our advantage and benefit. And second, interpreters must find ways to come together, crossing over sector-specific lines that we ourselves have drawn, as interpreting has expanded to different venues and parts of society. This does not mean our differences will disappear. But interpreters must have a uni-

fied voice if we hope to be recognized by society for what we do.

At a National Foreign Language Summit held in Washington, DC, in late 2010, current CIA Director and soon-to-be Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta spoke of what it will take to improve foreign-language proficiency in the U.S. His words reflect what I believe it will take for interpreting to adapt to the 21st century and to the new technologies that are reshaping much of human endeavor. He said: “A significant cultural change needs to occur.

And that requires a transformation in attitude from everyone involved: individuals, government, schools and universities, and the private sector.� I could not agree more.

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Photo by Ulf Buchholz

The Entrepreneurial Linguist Judy Jenner Adventures in Public Speaking

Happy 2012,

dear readers, colleagues, and friends! Where did 2011 go? It was a busy and successful year for me, and I hope the same holds true for many of you. If it was not, I have got good news: it is a new year, so let’s make it a great one.

I recently started reading all of the wonderful messages I have received since starting to write this column in 2009, and I am extremely grateful for all of the positive feedback. One colleague addressed New Year’s resolutions, and I wanted to touch on one resolution I had a few years ago: to become a better public speaker and to eventually become a speaker at ATA’s Annual Conferences.

For years, I attended the Annual Conference and was consistently in a state of awe about how wonderfully competent, professional, and interesting the presenters were. I would read their biographies in the back of the conference program and marvel at both their achievements and their ability to get up in front of a full room at the largest event for translators and interpreters in the world. I would get a bit star-struck when I would see my now good friends Corinne McKay and Jost Zetzsche entertain and educate fellow professionals with their wit and expertise. I would never be able to do it, I thought.

After a few years, colleagues started

Yahoo! Business Discussion Group ATA members can discuss business issues online at the following Yahoo! group: http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/ group/ata_business_practices. You will need to register with Yahoo! (at no charge) if you have not already done so, and provide your full name and ATA member number in order to join the group.

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judy.jenner@ entrepreneurial linguist.com

asking me to give a presentation about what I learned in business school and about how those lessons could be applied to our business of translation and interpreting. I remember saying in 2007 that I would give this presentation when hell froze over. It did not freeze over, but the Entrepreneurial Linguist lecture series made its debut in the spring of 2008, and I have been lucky enough to have enthusiastic responses and fantastic feedback. Who knew? I certainly did not expect it to go this well, but it is great to be proven wrong.

A few months ago, I had lunch with a colleague from business school who is a successful attorney and wanted to talk to me about his international efforts. He told me that he was baffled when he read on my website that I was speaking at conferences around the world. I am not easily offended, so I asked him why he was so surprised. He answered that I had been a terrible public speaker in graduate school—and he was right.

Point well taken—and he paid for lunch.

I have never enjoyed speaking in public, and I would break out in cold sweats back in high school when getting ready to make five-minute presentations. College and graduate school were not much better, even though I was able to defend my senior thesis successfully in front of a group of serious academics. I could not sleep for days before the event, so I figured: why become a speaker at ATA or other conferences and put myself through the misery? And then something happened: I found something I was passionate about and wanted to share it. I also realized that there would be no conferences for translators and interpreters unless

Judy Jenner is a Spanish and German translator in Las Vegas, Nevada, where she runs Twin Translations with her twin sister. She is also the president of the Nevada Interpreters and Translators Association. She hosts the popular translation blog, Translation Times (www.translationtimes.blogspot.com). You can also find her at www.entrepreneuriallinguist.com.

there were people willing to get out of their comfort zone to share what they know with others. I really wanted to contribute to the field, so I made a New Year’s resolution that I would overcome my reluctance to speak at professional conferences. For once, this was a resolution that I actually made happen.

(I am still working on the eat-lesschocolate resolution.)

I worked on my public speaking skills, practiced in front of the mirror, recorded myself, rehearsed my presentation to initial sharp criticism from friends and family, and got comfortable by giving the workshop in front of small, friendly crowds. Oddly enough, I can now sleep just fine the night before a presentation, but I am always a bit nervous before going in front of a room.

I think that is normal: after all, you have your colleagues’ professional development experience in your hands.

As you can see, I am very much not a natural-born speaker. And it is not necessary to be a complete natural at public speaking. I do believe that—with many important exceptions—public speakers are made, not born. Are you ready to get outside your comfort zone?

How about a New Year’s resolution? If I can do it, so can you.

I would love to see new speakers at ATA’s Annual Conference next year, so if you have been thinking about it, please consider submitting a proposal.

You will have plenty of time to prepare.

And if you ever need any advice on how to go from being a terrible public speaker to one who actually gets invited back, you know where to find me.

This column is not intended to constitute legal, financial, or other business advice. Each individual or company should make its own independent business decisions and consult its own legal, financial, or other advisors as appropriate. The views expressed here are not necessarily those of ATA or its Board of Directors. Ideas and questions should be directed to judy.jenner@entrepreneuriallinguist.com.

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Blog Trekker Your A-Z Guide to Successful Business Blogging (Posted by Susan Young on Get in Front Communications, www.getinfrontcom munications.com/blogging.)

Are you

ready to launch a blog or ramp up your existing one? Here are 26 tips to help you on your blogging journey: Add pictures, visuals, and images to your posts to communicate with readers on different levels.

Be the solution. Help people solve their problems. Solve, do not sell.

Consider all multimedia platforms such as video blogs, podcasts, and audio clips.

Define who you are, who your audience is, and what benefits blogging may bring you. The bottom line: Why are you blogging?

Eavesdrop on conversations to help you develop new content.

Forget the word count. Be clear and make your point. That’s it.

Grab people’s attention from the get-go with compelling and punchy headlines.

Highlight text, subheads, key phrases, and lists to emphasize important points and make your posts more reader-friendly.

Internet blogs are rich sources of information for translators and interpreters. They allow users to post questions, exchange ideas, network, and read news and commentary on a specific subject. The topics featured in this column are actual blog postings concerning issues pertinent to your colleagues in the field today. For more blog listings, visit www.atanet.org/careers/blog_trekker.php.

Kill the negative self-talk and judgment. You do not have to be a professional writer to be a great blogger.

sures that come along with a blog.

This is not a short-term commitment with fast results.

Listen to the conversations in chats and groups to determine what people are “stuck” on. There is your content.

Understand the analytics, metrics, search engine optimization, keywords, and other important tools to help you determine content, audience, readership, and more.

Move people emotionally through your words, language, metaphors, real-life experiences, and humanity.

Notice what other bloggers are doing.

Get ideas on layout, colors, design, content, and self-promotion.

Open your eyes, heart, and mind. We are in uncharted waters.

Position yourself as a credible resource in your field. Become the “go-to” guy (or gal).

Quit taking it personally (Q-TIP) if no one comments on your blog. Comments do not equal readers.

Remember we are in a real-time world. Post often so your blog does not become static and stale.

Simplify your words. Blogging is not business writing, even though you are probably writing about business. Be conversational. Consider yourself a creative artist.

Vary your posts but not your expertise.

Stick with what you know without painting yourself into a corner.

Write when you have something to say. Your readers will appreciate it.

X-ray your life. Take a close look into the body and soul of your professional career and personal experiences. Shine a light on them to diagnose your ”lessons learned.” The result: content.

Lots of it.

Yearn for more. Your curiosity and willingness to learn about new trends in your industry, technology, and life in general will serve you well in your blogging endeavors.

Zero in on your readers. Write as if you are speaking directly to them. A blog is merely the medium (vehicle) to reach mass amounts of people. Make each one feel special and connected to you.

Now I know my ABCs…

Try using patience. You may get frustrated or overwhelmed with the pres-

Interact with your readers by asking them questions in your posts and responding to comments.

Jump into the fray. Do not be afraid to take a stand on an issue or controversy in your niche or field. Boldness counts.

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For more information, visit www.atanet.org/webinars Live and On-Demand Training for Professional Translators and Interpreters

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Interpreters Forum María Cristina de la Vega mcdelavega@protranslating.com

Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: Traits Language Bureaus Look for When Hiring Freelance Interpreters

The most experienced

interpreters do not always make the most desirable candidates. As a company owner, common sense dictates that I would want to hire someone who is a veteran and whose accumulated knowledge will serve to represent my company well. Traditionally, we have measured a candidate’s desirability by looking at certifications, prior experience, and recommendations. However, professional credentials are but one filter available to us. Some credentialed interpreters may lack other traits that may prohibit them from completing assignments successfully. Here are some additional characteristics I look for when reviewing candidates for interpreting assignments.

Strong Work Ethic: I typically look for individuals who have a strong work ethic; who respond to calls on a timely basis and report to work early, not just before the event/trial is about to start. I look for people I can count on to do whatever research is required and who will share the fruits of this work with colleagues when needed. Thankfully, for the most part, interpreters are hard workers or they would not get far in a profession that requires them to keep abreast of developments in many industries.

Nonetheless, there are some interpreters who are so protective of their glossaries and research that it hinders their work and bears mentioning as a negative.

Well-Rounded: It is likewise desirable that the person be well-rounded and have other interests besides work. That curiosity is indicative of a balanced temperament, a happier disposition that is involved in life, and usually a greater vocabulary. We all know how addictive it is to encounter a new word and immediately feel the urge to find its equivalent in our language combination. The more

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interests we have, the more terms we will come across and hence the more resources we will have available.

Flexible Personality: Another advantageous trait in a person is a flexible personality, which indicates that he or she will cooperate and go with the flow if conditions are not the most appealing.

Our company policy is to discuss working conditions with the client in advance in order to forestall surprises.

However, Murphy’s Law sometimes strikes despite our best efforts. For instance, we may encounter someone who speaks too fast while giving a technical speech that we never received a hardcopy of beforehand, equipment can malfunction, the working schedule may vary, or the client may decide to record the proceedings on the fly. I look for interpreters who will be helpful in those circumstances and do their best to get the job done professionally without throwing their hands up in dismay. On the other hand, let me point out that I am not advocating that you should submissively acquiesce to unacceptable working conditions. Obviously, if he or she is asked to do something that will reflect negatively on performance, I would expect the interpreter to apprise the agency of the situation immediately.

If there is no time to do so because immediate action is required, then the interpreter must inform the client, in a non-adversarial way, of the reason it is not advisable to work in the manner proposed.

Professional Ethics: If not apparent at the outset, a would-be employer will ultimately become aware of an interpreter’s ethical practices through colleagues and clients and subsequent dealings with the person. Reputation always has a funny habit of catching up with you. I have been in business for

María Cristina de la Vega is certified as a Spanish English interpreter by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, the State of Florida, and the National Association of Judiciary Interpreters and Translators. She is the president of ProTranslating, Inc., a language services provider in Florida. She blogs at http:// mariacristinadelavegamusings.wordpress.com.

↔

many decades and thankfully have not been disappointed often. I believe firmly that what goes around comes around. I have dealt with interpreters who accepted an assignment only to leave us high and dry at the last minute after receiving a more lucrative offer. There have also been interpreters who tried to steal clients, and those who arrived late or sent someone else to cover the job they were supposed to do so they could accept another assignment. And then there are those who falsify their credentials to make themselves more attractive.

Some of you may shrug your shoulders and say that this does not happen in your world, but I assure you it does. You may just not be aware of it. In spite of the fact that it is very short-sighted to engage in such practices, many people do so believing that they will not be caught.

However, in this digital age where the flow of information is only enhanced with every passing day, these shenanigans come to light much quicker than in years past. In my case at least, any ethical transgression is a death-knell to a relationship with my company. There is no appeal.

A Good Fit Once the interpreter has begun to work with us, we always follow up to see if there is a good fit in terms of assignments. Does he or she work well with colleagues? Display proper etiquette in the booth or at a trial? Does he or she have the social skills and demeanor necessary to deal appropriately with the client and our staff? Is the candidate up to date with developments in the profession through membership and involvement in trade associations?

These are all ongoing questions that continue to augment the candidate’s profile after the initial interview.

To add some perspective, I would recommend reading an insightful · The ATA Chronicle

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GeekSpeak

Jost Zetzsche jzetzsche@internationalwriters.com

Cloud Illusions?

I’ve looked at clouds from both sides now, From up and down, and still somehow, It's cloud illusions I recall . . . .

Both Sides Now, Joni Mitchell

Cloud computing may be erasing the gains we've made in terms of vendor dependence lock-in. Going with a cloud solution means buying into the specific protocols, standards and tools of the cloud vendor, making future migration costly and difficult. How is this so?

Because standards are still being formed, and cloud computing is still too immature to reach the point where customers are demanding vendor independence.

I am not a

low-maintenance columnist, as the very kind editor of this magazine would surely share with you.

Rarely—if ever—have I managed to turn in my column on time. After all, I am a freelance translator, and most of you know what it means to live that kind of unstructured life. This month is once again no different, with my column sliding in at the very last minute, long after the official due date.

But sometimes things happen for a reason, and that may be particularly true today. Just as I sat down to write my planned column, someone on Twitter mentioned an article from Forbes magazine entitled “Cloud Computing's Vendor Lock-In Problem: Why the Industry Is Taking a Step Backward” (see http://tinyurl.com/6uelto4). And I have to tell you, I am sure glad that I had not already written about something less important.

Here are some excerpts: For more than a decade, IT managers and advocates have been working tirelessly to enable solutions based on common standards and protocols that can be built, supported, swapped out and replaced, regardless of vendor. And they almost succeeded—until lately.

No, this is not talking about language technology, but I still feel vindicated.

For several years now I have been trying to communicate that the most important problem we face with translation technology is the new capture mechanism in which most tool vendors are participating. While we have data exchange standards that are more or less well supported (TMX for translation memories, TBX for termbases, XLIFF for the translation data, and the upcoming Linport for translation packages), there are no mechanisms that enable Tool A to enter into the server- or cloud-based workflow of Tool B. So, if your client sends your project not as data but as a login that you can use within a tool to access an online-based project or—even more simply—actually to log into an online-based tool that gives you access to online-based data automatically, all the hard-fought-for advances

in widely accepted data exchange standards are nullified. Ironically, the data you access might even be in one of those standards—translation data especially could be in XLIFF format—but that does not help you much if no other tool can get to it.

You may be getting tired of all the rallying cries surrounding exchange standards, but this is what I think. We have reached a certain level of independence with our translation environment tools by being able to use almost any tool when we receive a translation project as an e-mail attachment or downloaded from an FTP server. However, now that many tool vendors are moving toward onlinebased workflows, this independence will soon vanish. I believe that we should join forces and voices to stand against this unless we want to lose the freedom to choose our work environment. To quote the much more eloquent author of the Forbes article: Only one thing will eliminate or reduce the risk of vendor lock-in in the long run: if end-user customers start demanding standardization and interoperability, just as they have in the past with onpremises applications. Once it dawns among organizations that use third-party clouds that they need to demand this from cloud providers, then the cloud providers will fall in line.

Interpreters Forum Continued analysis by Holly Mikkelson1 of the different types of interpreting, particularly her fourth point regarding the qualities of interpreters.

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Note 1. Mikkelson, Holly. “Interpreting Is Interpreting—Or Is It?” AIIC Webzine (Winter 2010),

www.aiic.net/ViewPage.cfm/page3 356.htm.

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ATA Certification Exam Information Upcoming Exams

Florida Orlando March 18, 2012 Registration Deadline: March 2, 2012

All candidates applying for ATA certification must provide proof that they meet the certification program eligibility requirements. Please direct all inquiries regarding general certification information to ATA Headquarters at +1-703-683-6100. Registration for all certification exams should be made through ATA Headquarters. All sittings have a maximum capacity and admission is based on the order in which registrations are received. Forms are available from ATA’s website or from Headquarters.

Massachusetts Boston May 6, 2012 Registration Deadline: April 20, 2012

Texas Houston February 25, 2012 Registration Deadline: February 10, 2012

New Certified Members Congratulations! The following people have successfully passed ATA’s certification exam: French into English

Russian into English

English into Japanese

English into Russian

English into Spanish

Daniela Ginsburg Baltimore, MD

Ksenia A. Annis New Waverly, TX

Hiroki Fukuyama Grapevine, TX

Marina Torchia Grand Island, NY

Maria N. Hamilton Suwanee, GA

Mary Ellen B. Kelly Williamsport, PA

M. Charlotte Wolf Niwot, CO

Gary M. Gluck Iowa City, IA

Active and Corresponding Membership Review Congratulations! The Active Membership Review Committee is pleased to grant active or corresponding status to: Maria E. Alvarado New York, NY

Stefano N. D'Amato Saint Lucie West, FL

Sajjad S. Hamadani Quarryville, PA

ATA eCONFERENCE Couldn’t make it to ATA’s Annual Conference this year? No problem!

Many sessions at ATA’s 52nd Annual Conference were audiotaped, synchronized with supporting slides, and integrated with handouts to create an online multimedia experience. To learn more, visit www.atanet.org/conf/2011/dvdrom.htm.

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Compiled by

Dictionary Review

Peter A. Gergay PGergay@aol.com

New English-Russian Dictionary of Electronics in two volumes/ Новый англо-русский словарь по электронике в двух томах Reviewed by: Boris M. Silversteyn Author: F.V. Lisovsky Publisher: ABBYY® PRESS Publication date: 2009 Number of pages: 763 (vol. 1) + 862 (vol. 2) ISBNs: 978-5-391-00005-1 978-5-391-00006-8 (vol. 1) 978-5-391-00007-5 (vol. 2) Price: About $40 Available from: www.abbyypress.ru Type and quality of binding: Hardcover; average

This dictionary

(thereafter, Lisovsky) was conceived as an updated fifth edition of the English-Russian Dictionary of Electronics by F.V. Lisovsky and I.K. Kalugin (thereafter, L&K); however, the scope of additions and corrections turned out to be such that the result is a completely new dictionary.

The New English-Russian Dictionary of Electronics has about 100,000 terms and 7,000 English abbreviations (listed at the end of volume 2), compared to the 63,000 terms and about 2,700 abbreviations contained in L&K. At the beginning of each volume there is also a list of 102 abbreviations of Russian technical terms.

Readability The pages in Lisovsky are arranged in two columns. The first word of even pages is shown at the top of the left column, and the last word of odd pages is shown at the top of the right column.

The font is easy on the eye. The headword of each entry is in bold red so the entries really stand out. All this makes it easier, and faster, to find an English term. Term search is also facilitated by red indexing of pages for each letter of the alphabet on the page border.

The dictionary uses U.S. spelling.

The few entries with British spelling, such as “gauge” and “mould,” are referred to as their U.S. “cousins.”

While perusing Lisovsky, no typos caught my eye.

Functionality and Range of Content Lisovsky covers a wide range of topics. In addition to information science and electronics, it includes terminology on the fabrication of electronic and computer equipment, global, regional and local computer networks, communications, radar, radio naviga-

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tion, radio astronomy, television and video technology, electroacoustics, quantum and cryogenic electronics, optoelectronics, magnetoelectronics, holography, telephony, and computer games, among other topics. Also included is terminology used in related fields of basic and applied science, such as mathematics, logic, linguistics, semantics, cryptography, grammar, game theory, general physics and chemistry, electrodynamics, optics, solid state physics, magnetism, crystallography, and quantum mechanics.

What’s In? What’s Missing?

As one would expect, being almost 60% larger than L&K, Lisovsky has many terms that are not found in the former. Some of these terms, such as “cookie,” “emoticon,” “SMS” (as in “short message service”), and “viral,” did not exist 10-15 years ago, while others (e.g., “callback,” “defragment”) were either overlooked or not included in L&K, possibly due to the dictionary size limitation.

Sometimes additional terms come in blocks of two to five new entries. A few examples are shown in Table 1 on page 36.

Lisovsky provides many more derivative terms (term collocations).

For instance, L&K has almost a pagelong list of derivative terms for “algorithm,” but the list contained in Lisovsky is even longer (two and a half pages).

Also, Lisovsky adds derivative terms to entries that have no derivative terms in L&K. For instance, while my second edition L&K entry for “server” lists three Russian translations (сервер is not one of them!) and no derivative terms, Lisovsky provides six Russian translations for the head entry plus a page and a half of derivative terms, from “anonymous server” to “Windows Internet Name Server.”

·

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Dictionary Review Continued Here is another interesting example.

In L&K, the entry “engagement” had no Russian translations at all, just a derivative term (“tip engagement”); Lisovsky provides four translations of the head entry, although I have a hard time figuring out what two of those— 3. обязательство and 4. занятие, дело—have to do with electronics.

The foreword states that in working on the dictionary, the main focus was to include terms related to the science and technology fields not covered sufficiently in current specialized dictionaries. Not having access to all current specialized dictionaries (I doubt anybody does, with the exception probably of the Library of Congress), I cannot verify the veracity of this claim, vague though it is. But I did encounter a few terms, some of them unexpectedly, that are not in my L&K, such as “garage”—1. нерабочее положение печатающей головки, 2. контейнер для картриджа с чернилами; “illusion” —иллюзия (again, where is the nexus, that is, the relation to electronics?); “markup”—разметка (напр., стра- ницы электронного документа); “marquee”—1. навес, тент (another nexus question mark), 2. инструмент для выделения области (растрового изображения), plus four derivative terms. I also found “platelet”—пластин[к]а малых размеров; “runaround”; “runaway”; “rundown”; and “typeover.”

Among terms not included in Lisovsky are “bioinformatics,” “Blackberry,” “blog,” “blogger,” “blogging,” “cloud computing,” “crowdsourcing,” “Facebook,” “netbook,” “texting,” “theory of probability,”1 “touch pad,” “tweet” and “Twitter” (in the Internet sense), and “YouTube.”

Another missing term: while “licencee” is included, “licensor” is not.

One might argue with some of the translations found in Lisovsky. For

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instance, the first Russian translations offered for “delete” (a verb) are удаление, стирание (nouns). A few other examples: “electrical engineer” (инженер-электротехник, rather than инженер-электрик); “equivalence” (a noun) is translated эквивалентный (an adjective).

Here are some factors that diminish the value of Lisovsky: • There is no Russian translation for “e-mail” as a message.

Table 1 L&K

Lisovsky

cloth

cloth clothe clothing clothoid cloud

cloud course

course courseware covalence covar

covar film

• It contains long descriptive explanations rather than concise translations. For example: “bathtub capacitor” is translated бумажный конденсатор в металлическом корпусе в виде усеченной четырехугольной пирамиды со сглаженными ребрами.

• In addition to the examples given earlier, why include entries such as “asteroid,” “creation” (вселенная), “greenhouse effect,” “farsightedness” (дальнозоркость, гиперметропия) in a dictionary of electronics?

• And the major thing that L&K has while Lisovsky does not: the index of Russian terms. With it, L&K has proudly served me as both an English-to-Russian and Russian-toEnglish dictionary of electronics. I would urge the publisher to consider adding it in the next edition.

Here are a few comments about the list of English abbreviations.

Seven thousand is an impressive number. However, some of them are truncated versions of existing terms or of term collocations rather than abbreviations. For example: “autoplot” (automatic plotter); “autopol” (automatic polarity indication); “digi-

film filmdom filmization filmland filmmaker filmography filmstrip sound

filmstripe* sound influence infocall** infoexchange**

informatics order

ordering responser

restart trap

trapping

influence influential Infobahn infobot infomercial infopreneur informant informatics order orderable ordered ordering responser responsiveness rest restart trap trapdoor trapezium trapezoid trapping

* The “e” in “filmstripe” is probably an L&K typo. ** Note the absence of these terms in Lisovsky; more on this later.

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peater” (digital repeater); “simulcast” (simultaneous casting); “sitcom” (situation comedy) [nexus, anybody?]; “trochotron” (trochoidal magnetron), translated as трохотрон; and “tropo” for “tropospheric.” They look like words (and some of them have actually become words in their own right), and should be included as such directly in the body of the dictionary. Indeed, some of them, such as “digipeater,” “simulcast,” “sitcom,” and “trochotron,” are included in the main dictionary. So why repeat them in the abbreviations section?

I have the same question about some genuine abbreviations that are listed twice—in the abbreviations section and also in the body of the dictionary. For example: ADELE, ADR (with a 13-line list of six Russian translations in both sections), DES, HAD, WAM, and many others. To me, this is just a waste of valuable “real estate.”

Overall Recommendation and Value for Money All in all, I think Lisovsky is a valuable dictionary. The price is good as far as dictionaries go. So, have I already discarded my 1987-vintage L&K? Of course not. For two reasons.

First, it still has terms that Lisovsky is missing (see the double-asterisk note to Table 1 on page 36 as an example); and second, even more important, it has the index of Russian terms mentioned earlier. But that’s me. I always keep older editions of new dictionaries.

Note 1. Although a lot of theory of probability terms are included, which is a good thing.

Boris M. Silversteyn is the current secretary of ATA. He is a past chair of ATA’s Divisions and Dictionary Review Committees.

He is a Russian and Ukrainian translator and interpreter specializing in science and technology, finance, business, law, and environment. He is an ATA-certified English↔ Russian translator and is a grader for ATA's English➝Russian and English➝Ukrainian certification exams.

Contact: bsilversteyn@comcast.net.

FOLLOW ATA ON What’s happening? Follow us on Twitter today!

To learn how, visit http:// twitter.com/atanet

American Translators Association

52nd Annual Conference Boston, Massachusetts H October 26–29, 2011 H Marriott Copley Place

Recap The Exhibit Hall was sold out, “Smart Business for Translators and Interpreters” was a hot topic, and the Division Open House and Speed Networking were all the buzz. Here’s your opportunity to relive moments from ATA’s 52nd Annual Conference … or see what you missed!

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View photo slideshow www.atanet.org/conf/2011/#photo Watch the video recap www.youtube.com/watch?v=pXd-Zx8epKk

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Humor and Translation

Mark Herman hermanapter@cmsinter.net

A Mis-Guided Missal

By the time you

read this column, the Catholic Church in English-speaking countries is supposed to have begun using a new English-language missal. According to Laurie Goodstein, writing in The New York Times on April 11, 2011: [the new] translation [was] produced after almost 30 years of labor, intrigue and infighting. The new missal, the book of texts and prayers used in the Mass, is intended to be closer to the liturgical Latin that was used for centuries than the current version. The church officials promoting it say it will bring an elevated reverence and authenticity to the Mass. Many Catholics who prefer a more traditional liturgy are eagerly anticipating the change.

However, it would not be too much to say that many English-speaking clergymen are revolted by and revolting against the new translation.

Goodstein quotes Father Sean McDonagh, leader of the Association of Catholic Priests, which represents about 10% of all Irish priests: What we are asking of the bishops is to scrap this text. I know people are not going to use it. I wouldn’t use it, because everything I know in terms of theology and anthropology and linguistics, it breaches every one of those.

But McDonagh’s statement is mild compared to that of Anthony Ruff in an open letter published in A merica, the National Catholic Weekly on February 14, 2011. Anthony Ruff,

O.S.B., is a Benedictine monk of Saint John’s Abbey and a professor of liturgy and Gregorian chant. He says: The forthcoming missal is but a part of a larger pattern of top-down impositions by a central authority that does not consider itself accountable to the larger church. When I think of how secretive the translation process was, how little consultation was done with priests or laity, how the Holy See allowed a small group to hijack the translation at the final stage, how unsatisfactory the final text is, how this text was imposed on national conferences of bishops in violation of their legitimate episcopal authority, how much deception and mischief have marked this process—and then when I think of Our Lord’s teachings on service and love and unity … I weep.

[Ellipsis in original] The problem, according to Goodstein, was that, after many years of wrangling over a proper translation: in 2001, … the Vatican issued ‘Liturgiam authenticam’ (Authentic Liturgy), an instruction requiring that translations of the Mass adhere literally to the Latin vocabulary, syntax, punctuation and even capitalization. And the Vatican appointed a committee it called ‘Vox Clara’ (Clear Voice) to advise the translation efforts, but it gradually took on a more supervisory role.

The “more supervisory role” was total control, and the result, as is obvious from the above, does not please. Especially disliked is the new Nicene Creed. This is the foundation statement of Christian belief, originally adopted at the Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D. Some object to the use of Latinate words like “consubstantial” and “incarnate.” But the real problem is that a lot of the new language simply ain’t English. The Nicene Creed begins in Latin with the word credo (I believe), which is not repeated but implicitly begins almost every clause which follows. English is not Latin, and the previously used English Mass repeats “we believe” (rather than the literal “I believe”) as often as necessary to make the meaning clear. But the new version does not do this. Consequently, it has sections like the following: He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead and his kingdom will have no end.

And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son is adored and glorified, who has spoken through the prophets.

Without an additional “I believe” between the “And” and the “in” at the beginning of the fourth line, the text makes no sense.

I predict there will be changes, and soon.

Herman is a librettist and translator. Submit items for future columns via e-mail to hermanapter@cmsinter.net or via snail mail to Mark Herman, 1409 E Gaylord Street, Mt. Pleasant, MI 48858-3626. Discussions of the translation of humor and examples thereof are preferred, but humorous anecdotes about translators, translations, and mistranslations are also welcome. Include copyright information and permission if relevant.

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